Digital Assets and Blockchain Day 2023
Overview
The CAASA Digital Assets and Blockchain Day brings together speakers and participants from single and multi- family offices, institutional investors, investment dealers, Canadian and global investment management houses, and affiliated service providers.
Keynote Speaker
Ian Morley
Chairman
Wentworth Hall Consultancy Ltd
Ian Morley
Chairman
Wentworth Hall Consultancy Ltd
Ian Morley is a successful business Angel and Entrepreneur.
He is the Chairman of Wentworth Hall Family Office and Consultancy, Chairman of Atitlan YRD, an award winning Crypto Multi Manager. Chairman of Salutem Senior Living, Chairman of Regenerative Medical Group, NED at Conister Bank, NED at CF@L, Director of Condor Trade and also holds various Directorships with a range of other companies covering Property, Alterantive Energy, Farmland ,Blockchain and Crypto currencies.
He is the author of Morley’s Laws of Business and Fund Management and one of the leading global figures and pioneers in the development of the Hedge Fund Industry. He ran one of Europe’s first and oldest Fund of Funds and subsequently helped build one of Europe’s largest privately-owned Fund of Funds. He has helped build, manage, own, buy, sell and mentor start-up businesses over the last twenty years. He founded and was elected the first Chairman of what is today known as The Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA), the world’s only truly global trade association for the Hedge Fund Industry. He has advised Central Banks, International Regulators and other International Organisations such as the EU and OECD on matters related to Economics, Markets and Regulation. He is actively involved in Family Office conferences and networks.
His articles have been published in such papers as The London Times, FT, International Herald Tribune and various trade publications. He has appeared frequently on BBC, radio and TV, Sky, CNN, CNBC, Bloomberg and various international TV and radio stations.
Ian trained as an Economist at LSE where he was Vice President of the Students Union. He is a member of Gray’s Inn and one of the few fund managers to be accredited as a journalist.
Ian served as a battle medic with a MASH unit and has completed sixteen International Marathons, one hundred and fifty Half Marathons and competed in weight lifting and dancing competitions. He was the London Theater Correspondent for the Irish Stage and Screen. He has also written about Running and Building a house in Italy for Italy Magazine. His other interests include boating, football, politics and philanthropy. He lives in London with his dog, cat and sometimes his children.
Distinguished Speakers
Sue Ennis
VP Corporate Development
Hut 8
Charlie Morris
Co-founder
CMCC Global
Vincent Molino
Head of Operational Due Diligence
Bitwise Asset Management
Ruairi Hanafin
Chief Investment Officer
Firinne Capital
Kerem Kolcuoglu
Managing Partner
Penrose Partners
Jillian Friedman
Chief Operating Officer
Ether Capital
Didier Lavallee
Chief Executive Officer
Tetra Trust Company
Eric Richmond
President
Coinsquare
Esther Zurba
Director
Castle Hall – The Due Diligence Company
Louis LaValle
Managing Director
3iQ Digital Assets (US)
Sebastien Davies
VP, Research
Aquanow
Vince Kadar
CEO
Polymath
Shaun Cumby
President
Virgo Asset Management
Erina Penkovsky
Director, Corporate Strategy
Allnodes
Sue Ennis
VP Corporate Development
Hut 8
Sue Ennis is an award-winning emerging technology and innovation champion, passionate about bringing global investor awareness and capital into opportunities in Canada’s thriving technology, natural resources and small cap sector. She is currently VP of Corporate Development at Hut 8 – one of North America’s largest and most exciting Enterprise Data Infrastructure as a Service providers and Bitcoin miners. Sue also sits on the board of Valour, a publicly traded technology company focused on bridging the gap between traditional capital markets and decentralized finance.
Over the past 15 years, Sue Ennis has been instrumental in raising over a billion dollars for Canadian structured product and small cap companies. She has helped drive retail and institutional investor interest and awareness into hidden and under loved publicly traded or pre-ipo Canadian company gems and steered under-appreciated Canadian companies in the fintech and digital asset sector into multi-billion market cap opportunities. Before joining Hut 8, she was VP of global partnerships at Shyft Networks, a public protocol designed to validate identity and compliance directly into open source blockchain data. Prior to that role, Sue was one of the first wealth directors at Coinsquare in 2017, where she helped launch commercial operations for the wealth division. Prior to this role she held leadership positions with Voyager and Invesco.
A certified blockchain expert, seasoned capital markets advisor and storyteller, Sue is a sought-after industry voice who has championed technological innovation as a media spokesperson and keynote speaker across the globe for her ability to simplify complex concepts into digestible, actionable, and investible ones.
When Sue isn’t running ultra-marathons in Greenland or the Middle East, working on a shark research boat in South Africa, or completing a jungle survival course in the Amazon, you can find her in Toronto and skiing in Collingwood with her family. Sue is a designated Chartered Investment Manager and holds a Certificate of Specialization in Corporate Finance and ESG Investing from Columbia Business School.
Charlie Morris
Co-founder
CMCC Global
Charlie is the co-founder of CMCC Global, a blockchain asset management company that manages three digital asset funds as well as the Liberty Bitcoin Fund. CMCC Global was founded in Hong Kong in 2016 and today has offices in Asia and North America. It has a particular focus on Fintech innovation in Asia. Charlie’s background as both a software engineer and management consultant allows him to combine a deep technical understanding of blockchain technology with the ability to evaluate its business implications.
Charlie’s involvement in the blockchain space has included advising financial institutions, developing blockchain applications and investing in companies and protocols. He has given keynote addresses at the CLSA Investor Conference, Franklin Templeton annual offsite and the Global Investment Forum. He has also presented to senior management at many large institutions including Fidelity, Putnam Investments and Wellington Management.
Vincent Molino
Head of Operational Due Diligence
Bitwise Asset Management
Vincent is Head of Operational Due Diligence at Bitwise Asset Management, and has worked in the investment industry for over 19 years. Prior to Bitwise, he was Head of Risk within Northern Trust’s fintech products and held leadership positions at Mercer, Permal Group, Barclays and J.P.Morgan.
Vincent has authored thought leadership pieces on crypto, fintech, risk management, operations and industry trends. He has also spoken at conferences hosted by Bloomberg, the CFA Society, the Managed Funds Association (MFA) and the Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA).
Vincent graduated from St. John’s University with a B.S. in Political Science.
Ruairi Hanafin
Chief Investment Officer
Firinne Capital
Ruairi Hanafin is the Chief Investment Officer at Firinne Capital. He is an entrepreneur, investor, and early proponent of blockchain technology. He also co-founded Canadian agricultural technology startup Grain Discovery. He has held positions in research and portfolio engineering in the quantitative portfolio management teams at CPP Investments, where he also founded the blockchain research group, and at the Vancouver derivatives analytics company FINCAD.
He holds a Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics from Trinity College, University of Dublin.
Kerem Kolcuoglu
Managing Partner
Penrose Partners
Kerem is an MBA and the Managing Partner of Penrose Partners, a blockchain-focused consulting firm advising startups, enterprises, governments and investors on navigating the blockchain and digital assets space.
Kerem is an advisor to the Canadian Technology Accelerators and to the Premier’s Office of FinTech for the Bermuda Government. He is also a Founding Board Member of the Bermuda Innovation & Technology Association (BITA) and a Founding Partner of the i3 Innovation Incubator in Bermuda.
Previously at PricewaterhouseCoopers and at MLG Blockchain, he has consulted multinational enterprises, governments and educational institutions on understanding and adopting blockchain technology. Bridging his experience in multiple industries, he has foreseen change and advised clients on navigating digital transformation in an age of disruption.
Jillian Friedman
Chief Operating Officer
Ether Capital
Jillian is the COO of Ether Capital (NEO: ETHC), a public technology company focused on staking and developing infrastructure to support crypto investors. As a lawyer and banking expert who has been active in the cryptocurrency space since 2014, she oversees Ether Capital’s long-term business strategy to become a central business and investment hub for the Ethereum ecosystem. She previously worked for National Bank of Canada where she led the bank’s blockchain and digital asset efforts with a focus on the wealth management, capital markets and risk sectors. Her legal experience includes digital assets, commercial finance and fintech.
Didier Lavallee
Chief Executive Officer
Tetra Trust Company
Didier brings over 16 years of capital markets and asset servicing experience with in depth knowledge of equities and foreign exchange to Tetra. Prior to becoming CEO of Tetra, Didier held various leadership positions at the Royal Bank of Canada including Head of Canadian Custody Product for RBC Investor and Treasury Services. Before that, Didier also ran RBC I&TS North American FX Sales Trading team, FX Product and held various roles in capital markets with RBC, UBS and Genuity. Didier holds a B.A. in Finance and Administrative Studies from Western University.
Eric Richmond
President
Coinsquare
Eric Richmond is the President at Coinsquare, a leading Canadian cryptocurrency exchange. He is also a founder of Tetra Trust Company – Canada’s first digital asset trust company and custodian. Eric has played a key leadership role in Coinsquare and Tetra’s strategic direction and led the execution and negotiation of multiple financings, acquisitions and strategic partnerships. He has in-depth knowledge of the principles, applications and current developments relating to blockchain technologies, and the regulators’ approaches to these technologies across multiple jurisdictions. Prior to Coinsquare, Eric was a lawyer at Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP, where he advised clients on a variety of corporate and capital markets transactions, as well as corporate governance and securities regulatory matters.
Louis LaValle
Managing Director
3iQ Digital Assets (US)
Louis LaValle is Manager Director of 3iQ Digital Assets (US) Inc. Louis joined 3iQ in 2021 and is responsible for the development, execution, and investment management of the firm’s institutional investment platform. Louis brings over 20 years of investment management experience advising global institutions on hedge fund, private equity, and digital asset investing. Prior to 3iQ, Louis held senior leadership positions at several alternative investment management firms including Neuberger Berman, EACM Advisors, Permal Group and SkyBridge Capital. He previously served as strategic advisor to Crescent Crypto Asset Management, a digital asset investment firm that created one of the industry’s first suite of investable crypto index solutions. He began his investment management career at Morgan Stanley, managing over $1 billion of capital on behalf of family offices and institutional investors. Louis holds a bachelor’s degree with honors from New York University (NYU).
Sebastien Davies
VP, Research
Aquanow
As VP, Research at Aquanow and Market Strategist at AQN Digital, Sebastien Davies focuses on industry analysis, investment management, and growth initiatives. He joined from CIBC Capital Markets, where he held roles in Institutional Equity & Derivatives Sales. Prior thereto, Sebastien conducted research and risk management at a long/short hedge fund.
Vince Kadar
CEO
Polymath
Vincent guides the growth of Polymath, delivering an innovative and evolutionary software platform for a new generation of capital markets, leaning on his successful 25 years of start-up and scale up experience in financial software and services, as well as telecom software.
Prior to Polymath, Vincent was the CEO of Telepin Software Systems Inc, a fintech software company providing a disruptive digital wallet and payments platform for developed and emerging markets globally (acquired by Constellation Software Inc. (TSX:CSU).
He has also held CTO and founding positions at Airwide Solutions, a software provider in mobile messaging and security software for the telecoms industry (acquired by Mavenir). Vincent is also a member of the Governing Council of the Polymesh Association, an institutional–grade permissioned blockchain built specifically for regulated assets.
Shaun Cumby
President
Virgo Asset Management
Shaun Cumby is a 28-year veteran of the professional financial markets, spanning both employment in Toronto and New York. His experience includes trading bonds, credit derivatives, equity, options, futures and crypto. As a managing director at TD Bank he managed a $26 billion corporate loan portfolio, complemented by $5 billion in hedges. At Dundee Bank of Canada, he worked with a dynamic team that impressively expanded the deposit assets from $100 million to $1.5 billion in under two years. The bank was acquired by The Bank of Nova Scotia. Subsequently, Mr. Cumby ventured into systematically oriented hedge funds, where he adeptly managed a range of portfolios, from long-short equities, an income-oriented equity fund and then an adaptive allocation futures strategy. In February 2018, he transitioned to 3iQ Corp. where he was instrumental in establishing and overseeing the 3iQ Global Cryptoasset Fund, The Bitcoin Fund, and The Ether Fund. Currently, Mr. Cumby is CEO/CIO at the helm Arxnovum Investments Inc. which was recently acquired by Virgo. A staunch advocate for bitcoin, he eagerly anticipates guiding investors to access and profit from this revolutionary technology.
Erina Penkovsky
Director, Corporate Strategy
Allnodes
Erina Penkovsky has made a few pivots in her career, most recently transitioning to the world of web3 and specifically focusing on staking so far. Erina is currently the Director of Corporate Strategy at Allnodes, one of the largest staking providers in the industry working with retail and institutional clients. Her focus is on expanding the company’s institutional presence and building their long term strategy while also promoting education around staking in the cryoto and traditional finance spaces.
Agenda 2023
Day 1
- September 28, 2023
- 10:30 am – 5:00 pm
- September 28, 2023
- 10:30 am – 5:00 pm
Day 1
10:30 am
Registration
11:00 am
Future of Staking: An Investable Security?
Just a few years ago, or perhaps a few months ago, or even a few weeks ago, many in this room may not have known what staking is. But now, it is as important to be up to speed on with regard to digital assets as knowledge of battery technology would be for those investing in EV companies. It is a driver for how these investments actually work, and are a crucial part of the infrastructure of these proof of stake digital assets. This panel is going to explain how the space works and how investors can profit from this.
Charlie Morris, CMCC Global
Erina Penkovsky, Allnodes
Eric Richmond, Coinsquare
Didier Lavallee, Tetra Trust Company
11:45 am
Institutional Grade Crypto
This is an age-old question when it comes to pretty much any investment. Is this digital asset space one that people should lock up their money in and think of it as a long-term bet, or something that they should be actively trading in order to avoid the pitfalls of a very dynamic market.
To be honest, this is a question endemic to all investments. Most would agree that real estate should be long-term, but many engage in trading new, including options on new builds, and can turn a pretty penny doing that as well. The same goes for stocks and bonds where the dichotomy between active trading, which may involve shorting, and long-term by and hold, which is about as old as a hills. How does this affect digital assets and how should investors be positioning their portfolios? This panel will talk about that and more!
12:30 am
Lunch & Keynote
Ian Morley has been an investor for more than 50 years and, as one might guess, has an opinion about many areas in the investment sphere (and many others as well!). In this keynote we will look back on what issues and hurdles the Hedge Fund industry experienced over 30 years ago and how Digital Assets are facing the same political hurdles and the opposition coming from traditional finance. As well as giving us his views on the geo-political world and how he has adapted his portfolio.
Ian Morley, Wentworth Hall Consultancy Ltd
Sue Ennis, Hut 8 Mining
1:30 pm
Now Talk – Unlocking New Horizons: Tokenization and digital assets within regulatory frameworks
Emerging technologies are reshaping the landscape of investment portfolios and activities while ensuring adherence to regulatory frameworks — particularly blockchain — can serve as the foundation for regulatory compliance with these alternative opportunities. This talk will delve into the benefits of tokenization including: enhanced liquidity, reduced friction, and increased accessibility to previously inaccessible asset classes, while emphasizing the pivotal role of blockchain technology in establishing regulatory compliance.
Vincent Kadar, Polymath
2:00 pm
NowTalk – A Review of the Investment Case for Crypto
Although Bitcoin was explicitly created to be an inflation hedge (among other things), investors naturally denominated BTC and other digital assets in fiat (usually USD) currency in order to have a frame of reference. There are Bitcoin Maximalists that purport that BTC should be the coin of the realm but until that time we will continue to denominate all assets in fiat and compare their returns in that base currency. This leads to the next question: are digital assets a good investment? That can be answered positively if it produces a return stream (aka price performance) that is superior on a risk-adjusted basis and/or offers correlation benefits compared to other assets. Even a low or negative-return security can be beneficial for a portfolio if its correlation is advantageous; and a high-returning asset can be a detriment if its downside correlation (that is, it loses value when other assets do) is greater than its upside correlation. This talk will delve into this data to find out if digital assets are suitable options for investors.
Shaun Cumby, Virgo Asset Management
2:30 pm
NowTalk- Crypto Venture: Worth the risk?
Basically all crypto investing is venture but not all venture investing includes crypto. For investors looking at the space, is crypto/blockchain investing at this stage worth the risk and how might the performance of these investments pay off in the future…and how much do these scenarios rely upon price action of cryptocurrencies like ETH? These points and more will be discussed in this illuminating talk!
Sebastien Davies, Aquanow
Jillian Friedman Ether Capital
3:00 pm
1:1 sessions
Your opportunity to connect with other delegates.
Meetings can be scheduled beforehand with our messaging & meeting app or simply occur organically on the spot.
4:00 pm
NowTalk – Lessons from FTX: The Cost of Ignoring ODD
Everyone should know what FTX is, its so called business plan, as well as the execution of it has been a thing of Senate hearings, and likely a book from Michael Lewis in the next little while. The interesting question is how did it get to be where it was? It had sophisticated institutional investors seemingly drop the ball when it came to diligence but venture is fraught with risk. What is simply because venture capital is inherently risky without a way to mitigate losses? Is this something that given the law of large numbers one might expect to happen at some point? Or is there some universal way that investors can protect themselves from these types of scenarios? This panel will look into that and more!
Esther Zurba, Castle Hall
James Burron, CAASA
4:30 pm
End of conference
Member – Investor
End Investors: Pensions, Endowments, Foundations, Sovereign Wealth Funds, or Single Family Offices
Event Registration Closed
Non-member – Investor
End Investors: Pensions, Endowments, Foundations, Sovereign Wealth Funds, or Single Family Offices
Event Registration Closed
Member – Managers
CAASA Members
Event Registration Closed
Member – Service Providers
CAASA Members
Event Registration Closed